28.11.12

UK CHAMPIONSHIP STORIES PART 3: RONNIE O'SULLIVAN

It
is 19 years to the day since Ronnie O’Sullivan won the first of his four UK
Championship titles.

For
many, this was the first chance to witness O’Sullivan’s unique brand of snooker
genius which, once seen, is never forgotten.

He
was still 17 and he beat a peak Stephen Hendry10-6 in the final. A whole world
of possibility lay before him but it transpired to be a world full of pain as
well as joy

O’Sullivan
was a brash kid, naturally talented but also with advantages over other
juniors. He had a full sized table at his home and his father would arrange for
leading amateurs and some professionals to come and play him.

Young
Ronnie practised hard and quickly became the best junior in the country. He turned
professional at 16 and won his first 38 matches. In that first season he
qualified for the final stages of the UK Championship but was beaten 9-8 by a maverick
of a different generation, Cliff Wilson.

He
nearly lost to Nigel Gilbert the following year, 1993, but came through 9-8 and
beat Ken Doherty, Steve Davis and Darren Morgan to reach the final.

Hendry
himself was only 24 but it was still a clash of generations. Hendry had been
the game-changing exponent of all out attacking snooker which O’Sullivan and
others were now employing to great effect. The stage was set at Preston Guild
Hall for an intriguing battle.

There
were three centuries in an exciting opening session – two for O’Sullivan and
one for Hendry – as O’Sullivan, showing no signs of nerves or any awe for his
celebrated opponent, opened a 6-2 lead.

In
fact, he had lost 6-2 to Hendry in the semi-finals of the Dubai Classic earlier
that season and felt that he had shown him too much respect, played the reputation
rather than the man. Such experiences were to be learned from.

O’Sullivan
had been groomed to be a winner in his own right and duly closed out a 10-6
victory.

It’s
briefly tempting to ponder what would have happened had it been – as it was up
to the previous year – a two day final, in which overnight uncertainty may have
played its part. But it’s also pointless. Nobody could deny that a major star
had arrived in style.

Hendry
put it best: “Ronnie plays the game like I used to. He’s fearless and
frightened of no one.”

O’Sullivan’s
reaction was: “After getting a taste of this I want more.”

In
fact, just a year later he was threatening retirement after losing to Ken
Doherty in the quarter-finals.

O’Sullivan
had taken the trophy to Gartree prison where his father was a year into his
life sentence for murder. The UK win was a source of pride for both men but the
separation triggered in O’Sullivan a battle with his own sense of certainty
about the world: things could go wrong and they frequently did.

He
repeated a 10-6 win over Hendry in the 1997 UK final but again the storm clouds
were gathering.

I
was a WPBSA lackey in 1998 and was charged with overseeing the launch for the
UK Championship in Bournemouth. O’Sullivan came along as defending champion and
behaved quite appallingly.

It
was obvious he was edging dangerously close to some sort of psychological cliff
and indeed withdrew from the tournament shortly before his first match.

These
were years in which he enjoyed success but struggled to control his emotional
problems. In 2000 in checked into the Priory Clinic, which did help him achieve
an equilibrium. In the immediate aftermath he was back to the nice, unassuming
lad he had always been deep down.

And
he was still producing some spellbinding snooker. O’Sullivan won his first
world title in 2001 and at the end of that year was in York, the new home for
the UK Championship, where he produced some of the best snooker I’ve seen from
him.

He
was 8-4 down to Peter Ebdon, a well established rival, in the quarter-finals
but swept back to win 9-8 and came into the pressroom determined to rub it in,
saying “You look into Peter’s eyes and he looks like a psycho. He plays like an
amateur. He’s got no class.”

And
then, after the semi-finals, we predictably heard the polar opposite side of O’Sullivan,
saying of the vanquished Mark Williams, “He’s a class act. I don’t fancy having
to play him for the next five years. I hope he retires to Spain and spends all
his time on the beach. I’ll even pay his expenses.”

In
the final, O’Sullivan ran through Ken Doherty 10-1 in just two hours, 17
minutes, a devastating display. It was his third UK title. He won a fourth in
2007, overwhelming Stephen Maguire 10-2.

The
key moment in this campaign had come the previous evening in the semi-finals
against Mark Selby, who brought his toughness and tenacity to bear to take it
the distance.

Needing
to concentrate, O’Sullivan sat in his chair counting the bumps on a spoon. When
he got his chance in the decider he made a 147 to win it.

This
was another glorious chapter in the book of his life and career which had
already had more plot twists than the average page-turner.

The
previous year he had literally walked out of the tournament, trailing Hendry 4-1
in the quarter-finals. Some had sympathy, others contempt. O’Sullivan was by
now used to both.

Throughout
the drama, controversy and spells of brilliance, he remained as articulate and
fascinating as he had been as a worldy-wise 17 year-old in 1993.

“It’s
fine being the best player at 17 but I want to be the best player when I’m 21,
when I’m the finished article,” he said after winning the title back then.

This
year he was the best player at the Crucible at the age of 36 when he won his
fourth world title. Aside from one PTC he hasn’t played professionally since
and says he has no plans to do so this season. Perhaps he will never play
again.

It’s
certainly true that not everyone will miss him but his contribution to snooker
in the 19 years since that first triumph is incalculable. As the game has
expanded to horizons well beyond the shores of the UK, it is O’Sullivan more
than any other player who has led people to the sport.

With the greatest amount of respect Dave, & without trying to blow any smoke, I do find your articles heart-warming. You’ve basically written a book with all your articles that you’ve put together….

As for Ronnie, 19 years to the day since he first won it, wow. Do you know if the man has been approached to sit on the sofa at all by any of the TV companies? Rather than listen to snippets of the man, I’d like to see him on the sofa or even in the commentary box, explaining what he believes is going on in the players that are playing minds, as opposed to his own. I'm sure he'd make us all both smile & laugh.